Floating Numeral Quantifier Constructions in Japanese and Combinatory Categorial Grammar

Kenji Yokota

Abstract

The paper investigates the information structure that licenses the Japanese floating numeral quantifier (FNQ) in terms of prosody and context from the point of view that the pitch reset on the FNQ affects the information structure and plays a crucial role in determining the interpretation of the FNQ. First, I argue that FNQ sentences are potentially ambiguous between an event-quantifier reading (i.e., a VP-related FNQ reading), and an object-quantifier reading (i.e., an NP-related FNQ reading) where such a reading is possible. The syntactic and semantic difference yields distinct prosodic phrasings (in accordance with information-structure) which contribute to the disambiguation of the two readings and the grammaticality. Second, I show how the prosody-syntax view can be integrated into the framework of Combinatory Categorial Grammar.

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